Chandler Smith showed that team orders don’t exist in NASCAR as he stole the lead from Front Row Motorsports teammate and title contender Layne Riggs on a restart with 11 laps remaining in the Black’s Tire 200 to claim his third victory this season and 10th of his career in the Craftsman Truck Series.
If Riggs had won the 200-lap race at Martinsville Speedway, he would have taken the lead in the series standings with one race remaining in the season. Instead, he now heads to Homestead for the season finale 20 points behind Kaden Honeycutt, who finished 14th.
“I’m really surprised he did that,” Honeycutt said about Smith winning the race. “Twenty points, but definitely not comfortable in Homestead next week.”
Entering Martinsville, Riggs knew he had to win both Stages and the race if he wanted to remain in contention for the series championship headed to the season finale. Riggs won both Stages, recorded the fastest lap, and with 20 laps remaining possessed a 1.580-second lead. However, everything changed when Tyler Reif spun Carson Ferguson on the backstretch.
NASCAR assessed Reif a two-lap penalty for spinning Ferguson, but it was that ninth caution period that opened the victory door for Smith. Riggs elected to restart the race on the inside of the front row with Smith on the outside. Tristan McKee was behind Riggs while Ben Rhodes elected to go behind Smith.
When the green flag waved with 11 laps remaining, Smith executed a better restart than his teammate and grabbed the lead. Rhodes snatched second, shuffling Riggs back to third.
“I felt better on the top on restarts all night long, taking the lead back from the 77 (McKee),” Riggs said. “I just felt like I was just too loose to fire off on restarts. When you have a good balance on the long run, you have to be too free on the initial runs, so I wanted to take the top. My team kind of differed against that. They didn’t want me to take the top because then you put the control of your race in the guy’s hands on the inside of you. He can use you up. Who knows if he would have played nice or not.”
Smith eventually claimed a 0.574-second over Rhodes and finished 1.102 seconds ahead of Riggs.
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Layne Riggs (#34) leads the pack after the restart.
“We’ve been through a very rough patch since the Chase started,” said Smith, who’s third in the standings but out of contention for the championship. “I’m truly humbled right now for this experience.
“Martinsville’s been one on my bucket list to win for quite a while. I struggled here for a while. Tonight, the car just felt exactly how it needed to be.”
Riggs congratulated Smith but noted “those bonus points really would have been nice, and even more than that I wanted a grandfather clock really, really bad.”
“We led so many laps. I’m just disappointed,” said Riggs, who led 156 laps.
On the final restart, McKee hit Honeycutt’s left side, sending him high in turn one which allowed the rest of the field to freight train underneath him. After the race, Honeycutt talked with McKee.
“I had nothing against him. I just wanted to ask him if the 88 (Ty Majeski) hit him or not,” Honeycutt said. “When I looked in my mirror and I saw he was sideways, I didn’t know if he got free in or if he got run over, I just wanted to see what he said.”
After watching the replay, Honeycutt said, “He (McKee) was just trying to give Majeski room, and I didn’t get the call that we were three wide until too late.”
“It’s a sucky deal,” Honeycutt continued. “It was a struggle today. I felt like we were good on the long run, just couldn’t fire off and then just made an adjustment there and just went too far.”
The race was halted twice for a total of 9:42 so the track could be cleared following multi-truck crashes. It had seven lead changes among four drivers.
A North Carolina native, Deb Williams is an award-winning motorsports journalist who is in her fourth decade covering auto racing. In addition to covering the sport for United Press International, she has written motorsports articles for several newspapers, magazines and websites including espnW.com, USA Today, and The Charlotte Observer. Her awards include the American Motorsports Media Award of Excellence, two-time National Motorsports Press Association writer of the year, and two-time recipient of the Russ Catlin award. She also has won an award in the North Carolina Press Association’s sports feature category. During her career, Deb has been managing editor of GT Motorsports magazine and was with Winston Cup Scene and NASCAR Winston Cup Scene for 18 years, serving as the publication’s editor for 10 years. In 2024 she was inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame.